The demands on wireless communication capabilities in today's society are increasing rapidly. In particular, fast and easily accessible communication is desired through hand-held devices over large areas. It is particularly challenging to achieve such communication for mobile devices which are moving, e.g. when moving over large distances with poor network coverage or when affected by unknown sources of noise interrupting a signal for communication, such as clients moving on e.g. trains, airplanes, busses and other types of public transport vehicles. In particular, if a client, such as a mobile phone, moves over large areas the client has to connect to several base stations in order to maintain a sufficient connection for communication.
This increasing demand from passengers to be able to communicate through mobile phones and other handheld terminals when travelling on e.g. trains, also includes an increased demand to be able to get access to the Internet with laptops, PDAs etc. Further, with the new smartphones, and the way these are used, with e.g. continuously operating applications, many phones are active at all times, meaning that many handovers are required when the train moves. Even though this problem is common for all public transport vehicles, it is especially pronounced for vehicles moving at high speed, such as trains and airplanes, and trains are in addition facing problems with poor line-of-sight between the base stations and the train. This puts a strain on the wireless network infrastructure, leading to poor performance.
Moreover, train carriages are made of metal, and even the windows are normally covered with a metal film. Accordingly, train carriages are shielded compartments, and direct communication between terminal antennas within the carriages and externally located antennas is difficult to obtain. The mobile nature of a client with respect to the base stations may also introduce several potential sources of communication performance degradation. Such sources may derive from complex terrain, competition for available channels, or the source may be an unknown source of noise related to e.g. radio-frequency interference.
To this end, public transport vehicles, such as train carriages, are often provided with an external antenna connected to a repeater unit within the carriage, which in turn is connected to an internal antenna. Hence, the communication between the passengers' terminals and the operator antennas outside the vehicle occurs through the repeater unit. Similarly, it is known to provide a mobile access router for data communication, also connected both to an external antenna and an internal antenna, in each carriage, in order to provide Internet access on board the vehicle. Such mobile access router solutions are e.g. commercially available from the applicant of the present application, Icomera AB, of Gothenburg, Sweden, and are also disclosed in EP 1 175 757 by the same applicant. This method has greatly improved the reliability of high-bandwidth wireless communication for trains and other large vehicles.
However, a consequence of the above-described developments is that many problems relating to the management of data are emerging, in particular due to the sheer volume of it. Moreover, presently known solutions regarding the management of data are often inadequate in terms of user (i.e. passenger) satisfaction and are furthermore oftentimes based on out-dated requirements and passenger needs.
Further, a specific problem in known communication systems of the above-discussed type is that voice communication, such as telephone calls, are very sensitive to disturbances, such as increased latency.
To this end, many attempts are currently made to make wireless communication for passengers on-board trains and other public transportation vehicles more efficient.
However, many passengers also have a need or desire for quietness and silence. To this end, many train operators and the like offer the possibility of travelling in quiet compartments, which may also be referred to as silent coaches, quiet cars, quiet zones, etc. In such compartments or coaches, you are supposed to behave quietly, and it is normally not allowed to speak loudly, or even speak at all. However, despite such rules, it happens frequently that passengers talk in their telephones, thereby disturbing the other passengers desiring silence,
To this end, many operators have deliberately not installed cellular repeaters in the silent coaches/compartments, thereby making it more difficult to make telephone calls. However, nowadays, many calls are made over the WiFi network instead of over the cellular network, e.g. using VoIP (Voice over IP) and a VoWIFI (Voice over Wi-Fi). The absence of a cellular repeater in the coach is consequently no longer efficient for prohibiting telephone calls and for enforcing the regulations. Further, even though it would be possible to remove also the access points for the internal WiFi network in the silent coaches/compartments, such a measure is not at all desirable, since it would also hinder silent use of the WiFi, such as e-mail correspondence, reading of newsletters, web browsing, etc. In fact, many passengers choosing to travel in a silent coach/compartment does this for the purpose of being able to work more efficiently, and these possibilities would be severely restricted and deteriorated if there were no access to efficient data communication.
There is therefore a need for an improved method and system for communicating with clients on public transport vehicles, and in particular trains, and specifically which provides improved measures to enforce rules of silence and quietness.